Web content typically is defined by markup language, for example hypertext markup language (HTML) or extensible HTML (XHTML) and associated styles, scripts, and meta-data which are embedded within a markup language document that can be rendered in a web browser.
Microformat specifications allow semantics to be applied to markup language documents such as, for example, HTML or XHTML documents, by adding additional microformat markup to the preexisting markup documents. A machine that supports a particular microformat specification can extract meaning from a document that includes microformat markup that complies with the microformat specification by interpreting the additional microformat markup that has been added to the document.